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Tip - Finding apps that work on an older iPhone or older iPod Touch

Users of older iOS devices are often distressed by the difficulty in finding compatible apps. It is possible to construct a Google search which returns all compatible apps and rejects most incompatible ones.


Assuming I didn't make any mistakes, here's a Google search which will find every app in the US iTunes store which is compatible with the iPod Touch 2G or iPhone 3G, and which includes the word "turtle". (You can replace "turtle" with any search term you want).

turtle site:itunes.apple.com/us "requires ios 4.2" OR "requires ios 4.1" OR "requires ios 4.0" OR "requires ios 3.2" OR "requires ios 3.1" OR "requires ios 3.0" OR " requires ios 2.2" OR "requires ios 2.1" OR "requires ios 2.0"


Likewise, this search will find apps in the US iTunes store which are compatible with the original iPhone or original iPod Touch, and which also include the word "turtle" (Again, change "turtle" to anything you want).


turtle site:itunes.apple.com/us "requires ios 3.1" OR "requires ios 3.0" OR " requires ios 2.2" OR "requires ios 2.1" OR "requires ios 2.0"


Note that the results will include apps with specific hardware requirements, like the iPad or iPhone 3GS. Still, this will filter out 95% of apps which are incompatible with the desired iOS devices. I'm wary of adding search elements to filter out undesired hardware, because they might also remove desirable apps.

iPod touch

Posted on Apr 6, 2013 2:47 AM

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6 replies

Apr 9, 2013 12:49 AM in response to stevejobsfan0123

Ultimately, I think the best way to find iOS apps for older devices would be to create a web page which would accept text input, and then forward it to the Google engine along with a string of modifiers. You could use radio buttons to select the category of iOS device to search for, and which country's iTunes store to search.


It will be a something of a chore to adapt this technique for all the non-English-language iTunes stores, though.


(Didn't mean to slight you, Stevejobsfan0123, you deserve a million points as well!)

Apr 26, 2013 3:42 PM in response to mackerm

Here is a web-based form to search for apps:

https://sites.google.com/site/iossearch/


Rather than radio buttons, it has pull-down menus to select country and device. It uses pretty much the same search terms as the above examples, though I added the term "iPhone, iPod" to filter out apps which require the iPhone 3GS or iPad. So far, the new search term doesn't appear to be causing any trouble, but this is still a work in progress.

Tip - Finding apps that work on an older iPhone or older iPod Touch

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